The present invention relates to techniques for communicating information.
Fraudulent financial transactions involving stolen personal financial information are becoming increasingly common. This personal financial information is often stolen because of insufficient security in the communication techniques that are used to perform financial transactions. Most existing solutions to these security problems only offer limited protection and can be cumbersome to use. For example, tokens (such as pin codes or passwords) are sometimes used to authorize a given financial transaction. However, such tokens can also be stolen or compromised because the limitations of human memory often results in the use of predictable tokens.
Wireless networks create additional security problems. For example, data packets containing financial information (which may possibly be encrypted) are often communicated between devices via a wireless communication system, such as a wireless local area network (WLAN). Unfortunately, in existing WLANs it is difficult to ensure that transmitted data packets are received (or are only received) by an intended receiver. Consequently, communication between devices may be monitored by an (unknown) third party. Furthermore, when a given financial transaction occurs between unaffiliated parties (such as a customer and a store), information about the encrypted data (such as the transaction information) may need to be exchanged during the communication. However, if the third party intercepts this information the financial transaction may be compromised.